Adios, Orlando

I hope Ed S. fulfills his promise (in that season ticketholder meeting) and hires a full time shooting coach for the team. But it is definitely good the majority of the team is down there trying to get better. If the Sixers have an tough season this year but the youngsters develop further and get some seasoning I'd call it a success. Even with Miller back (or probably anyone but LeBron or Kobe) this team wouldn't be a contender this year anyway.

Well they aren't playing in the Las Vegas summer league, the orlando trip is an actual summer league. Comcast has some BS excuse but I see it as cheap ass money saving move that wasted two weeks of Speights and Holiday off season.

Hey brain - in your win share discussion - this is what i'm interested in seeing, not just miller / brand but
the combo of miller/green vs lou/brand?

realistic post Brian. The players we have are what has to get better as there really is no "savior" for this group...we need to get one from who we have. Even next year theres no guarantee any high profile FA comes here...philly is a 500 team that is a long way off to being in the championship mix. You know Sam interests me. Hes an athletic 7 footer who blocks shots and rebounds...he has the tools to be great. I tend to think he could be worked with to be great....his hands can be improved with work, so can his shot. I really think he has potential and his issues are mental...not physical.
I mean guys like him are hard to find...he must have a really bad rap around the league.
What do you guys think ? Mental or physical ?

It's equal parts mental and contractual with Sam. He's got all the physical tools. Even his production has been pretty good, it's just no one knows where his head is at, no one knows why he doesn't work on his game, and no one's willing to gamble $26M that they'll be the ones to get through to him.

look at what you wrote about his tools to be great, he could be worked with to be great...etc...

and now think about how long he's been in the league and how little improvement he's shown...that points to a questionable off season work ethic

then he got booted off the canadian national team when they were trying to make the olympics - how many other nba players have been kicked off a national team desperate to make the olympics

then there's public comments, all the way back to the Jim O'brien days, he makes when things don't go 'his way' or the sixers start to mess with 'his minutes'.

A lot of Sams rep around the league is going to come from a lack of improvement - he's been in the league long enough - a terrible offensive game, prone to being in foul trouble, questionable 'impact' on a team locker room due to public comments, AND the fact that his contract runs 'long' in that everyone wants money off the cap for the '2010 bonanaza' which is looking a lot less like a bonanaza with cap projections that came out this week (I wonder if the NBA sort of made up those projections to cut down on all the talk for next summer).

Sam had some 'spin control' comments in todays philly papers as he watched the sixers at summer league, but I don't buy it until we hear about him showing up with the rest of the team either with marc price of pcom or somewhere workingo n his game in the off season

Re: Gortat, while obviously I'm not as high on him as you (Brian) are you are right that that section was more about the lack of a game-changing free agent than it was about any particular player.

Re: two small forwards, I certainly agree that AI2 _can_ play the 2, just that his natural position is at SF. If the 76ers did play best with him at shooting guard last year I'm guessing its because a B+ version Iguodala is still a significant upgrade over Willie Green's 'A' game. I kinda doubt I'm in the minority with that opinion.

re: the gatorade high school player of the year, I wasn't suggesting that Jrue is going to step in and be LeBron, rather that the kid's ceiling worth writing home about and on a team that realistically isn't close to winning a championship, one's ceiling is far more important than one's floor.

Meh. I know y'all wanna pump a pro-Jrue article, but it was just weird how he says the Gatorade award is a major barometer then jumps in at 2001, the year once-in-a-lifetime phenom LeBron makes the scene. The award's been around since 1985. There was an obvious reason for that (sheesh, did he think noone would look?): the previous three winners haven't done anything of note in the NBA. Two of 'em weren't even drafted.

I mean, is he really trying to suggest Jrue's probably in the same league of impact with LeBron, DHo, Oden and Love? Really? How about some years the high school talent isn't that strong, but somebody's gotta win the trophy.

Also not too keen on lumping Lawson, Maynor and Teague in like they're all of the same level, too. Lawson is obviously a couple cuts above and that's why those Jrue vs. comparisons are always torqued into something sketchy.

Jrue's ceiling is arguably higher, but there's not a whole lot of debate over whose floor is lower.

They took the loss again. Let us hope this is the last of these combined teams. I don't think it helped any of the kids from either team really learn anything since it ran neither team's offense and each part of the team had differing goals.

Did you guys also notice Holiday not being able to stay in front of Maynor on multiple occasions? Hence the five fouls on Jrue and the 7 out of 7 from the line for Maynor. And Maynor is another rookie that hasn't even sniffed the league yet himself. Guess we'll all have to go thru the growing pains together. Being known for defensive capabilities seems to be a different animal when compared to staying in front of a lower rated and drafted point guard. Mebbe he'll come around.

Sixers are gonna suck this year. They have a very young team that loves to fast break and the PO might give trouble to even Brand. I know we can live without Miller but I sure would love a veteran point right about now.

"Speights, who averaged just 14.2 points on 39 percent shooting, was downright frustrated with his performance. ``I thought I would (dominate), but things happen I guess,’’ he said. ``It just didn’t go my way all week. I gotta get back to work on my post game, like I did in college. I’ve got to go back and get used to playing down there again.’’"

It seems all the Sixers youngsters know what they need to do for the team going forward.

I don't think so at all...I have no idea what's going on with the knicks this off season, I have to wonder if they're just being played by agents to get better deals in other places, kidd and hill made no sense on that roster...and I don't think Miller does either. With Portland signing milsap to the offer sheet there's only the MLE out there right now for Miller exccept for a S&T.